…REALLY going to be worth the time, trouble, and travel that I apparently am going to have to expend in order to acquire a bottle? Bear in mind that it’d all be for the sake of a single throwaway post; and yet, I really am obsessive that way and I know it. I also suspect that I will be grimly determined to like it even if it tastes like… ten buck wine, which while not really awful* is still not perhaps the most worthy vessel for my muse.
Open thread, I guess.
Moe Lane
*Although in comparison to that glass of rhone that I had yesterday…
I’d buy a bottle just to annoy wine snobs. Probably no worse than the house wine at most restaraunts.
I prefer the boxed stuff, “Chillable Red” Franzia I think, price was right and the stuff is palatable to good. A mix of fruity and red wines. Keep it chilled it’s better that way. Also it’s fun to watch people’s noses wrinkle when you get it at a wine store. Try Chaucer’s Mead honey wine if you want something better, don’t worry it’s not real mead I’ve had both and know the difference. Especially the morning after if you don’t drink enough water with real mead.
Call the folks over at Corridor Wine & Spirits (officially called “Total Wine” now), and ask them to special-order it for you. The Facebook page for “Wines For Dummies” claims that it’s available in MD, although I have not yet received a response from their “send me info” link. Since I’m doing this just before midnight on Saturday, perhaps that has something to do with it.
I still think there are better uses for $10 that you want to spend on wine — I just finished a second tasty, tasty glass of Root One Carmenere, which I think you might like. Still, when the muse calls, you answer.
Eh, I need a bottle of unassuming white anyway to do a sausage and chicken stew recipe that I need to try out today; I figure that I can try the similarly-indifferent Chianti at the same time and use that for cooking experiments.
Also, I thought that it was hysterical when commenters admitted that, yeah, they’ve been pronouncing “pinot grigio” wrong all along. 🙂
I’ve found bottles of ten buck wine that are better than stuff costing 3x as much.
And let’s recall that William F. Buckley took pride in never serving wine that cost more than that.
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Distribution of alcoholic beverages is a pretty major bottleneck. If you have a large operation or enough of a reputation to charge a large premium, you can get your product on shelves far and wide. If you have a small or even medium-sized operation, your product is going to be largely sold close to home. (And the fact you’re not spending much in marketing and shipping is going to be reflected in the price.)
Also, taste preferences tend to vary by region. In my home area we like sweet wines (up until the yuppies started fleeing California for greener pastures, anyway). So you can still easily find things like Indian Creek’s White Pinot Noir (really, it’s rose) for 9 bucks, and Koenig’s Riesling Ice Wine for $15. Both of which I’ll highly recommend as outstanding. (And both of which are obviously labors of love. Other varieties and styles would certainly more efficient.)
Those I named are good medium-sized operations that can ship out your way. The smaller operations, bluntly, can’t.